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WRUP: Pandaren vs. Ethereals
Every week, just at the start of the weekend, we catch up with the WoW Insider staff and ask them, "What are you playing this week?" -- otherwise known as WRUP. Join us to see what we're up to in and out of game, and catch us in the comments to let us know what you're playing, too! On Thursday, Blizzard uploaded a curious new picture to its Facebook page. It's called "Glimpses," and it shows three ethereals in a building that looks identical to Cordell's Enchanting in Stormwind. But a glimpse of what? Patch 4.3? The next expansion? The picture set off a flurry of speculation. One intrepid soul decided to treat the names as anagrams, converting Vaultkeeper Razhid to "hide a true leak," with "remaining letters ZPRV." I tried playing around with the letters myself, and all I can seem to make out of it is "Bill is The Mole." What do you think that means? Of course, a lot of people out there are wondering whether or not ethereals will play a major part in the next expansion. So, in addition to the "What aRe yoU Playing" question, this week, we asked our columnists a very simple followup question: %Poll-67612%
New Icecrown expansion concludes WoW TCG's Scourgewar arc
World of Warcraft TCG players, rejoice! The newest expansion set to the incredibly popular WoW trading card game, Scourgewar: Icecrown, is now available. A host of new heroes, items, characters (including Thrall, Jaina) and some special guests (the awesome airships The Skybreaker and Orgrim's Hammer) are combating The Lich King's forces. Also new to this expansion are Scourge heroes and allies -- play as and recruit Arthas' toughest warriors, including vrykul, to strengthen your deck. And who better to hunt the Lich King than the greatest hunter of all time: Hemet Nesingwary? Included in every trading card game expansion have been some rare goodies, andIcecrown is no exception. For those lucky enough (or with enough cash for scrounging on eBay), the rare mount Wooly White Rhino, the common loot paint bombs and the uncommon Ethereal Portal, which functions as a super cool-looking hearthstone, are available in this expansion.
Breakfast Topic: What Race or Organization should make a return in the Expansion?
So I've been thinking a lot about lore lately, and one thing that's been nagging for a long time is how fast some really cool and interesting storyline and organizations seem to fade into the background once the patch or zone that focuses on them is over and done.Example prime might be the Ethereals. They were an amazing group. The Consortium was Goblins except with actual charisma, business savvy, common sense, and inventions that worked. The Protectorate was a pretty badass group of elite fighters battling the forces of darkness. Even the Ethereum had a story of tragedy and corruption to make the Scarlet Crusade look like amateurs at the whole fanatic game. But in Wrath? Okay, we get some Ethereum hanging out with Malygos' posse, but that's it. Poof. Ethereals are all but gone. I would have loved to see them selling their Eco-dome tech to settlers in Northrend's snowy areas or something, or handing us monthly gem bags for Frost Wyrm Ivory.
Dealing with old currencies
Gaviedrummer has exactly the problem that I have, only mine is probably worse: he has about 50 Badges of Justice left over from the last expansion. True, I've only got about 30, but I've also got stacks of Apexis Shards, Spirit Shards, Halaa Tokens, Obsidian Warbeads, and pretty much every other old reputation and currency item from the Burning Crusade sitting around clogging up my bank. And while some of it is just me being lazy (I could turn the Warbeads in, and I think I could probably grind out a few more Halaa tokens to pick up something there), as gaviedrummer finds out, most of it is completely useless. Yes, we can still trade for level 70 items, but who needs those any more?It would be nice, especially with the soulbound stuff (I presume I will someday have an alt coming up through Outland that might need some help), for Blizzard to give us an out. Even if it requires level 80 to do, and even if the exchange rate is terrible (something like one level 80 badge for five or ten level 70 badges), at least we'll be able to get rid of the old stuff. Obviously, they're worried that if they offer exchanges for new items, people will go back and grind the old instances for the old currency. But there has to be some middle ground or a level requirement or something, some rate that allows us to get something for the old junk, while keeping current level 80s from exploiting the system. Heck, even cloth has a reputation turn-in value, at the very minimum.The Stone Keeper's Shards at least have a turn-in for honor, and at the bare minimum, that's what you'd want for any currency -- something cheap that you can just cash out of the system with all of your leftovers. Blizzard may say what's past is past (and like I said, I may just need to spend a weekend cleaning out the bank), but it would be nice to have an NPC in Shattrath that can say "Oh, you're level 80? Let me just take those old tokens off your hands at a discounted price!" And it would be an Ethereal, of course.
Ethereal introduces in-line surge protector for HDMI
Now here's something useful. Ethereal has just introduced the HDM-SP, which is being hailed as the world's first in-line surge protector designed specifically for the protection of the HDMI interface. It's built to withstand up to 8KV of voltage surge, and obviously, to keep your HDMI devices from getting fried in a storm. There's no mention of a price / release date (and we can't find an image to save our lives), but we suspect we'll hear more -- if but a whisper -- at CES.
Upper Deck announces new loot items, including an Ethereal vendor pet
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/Upper_Deck_announces_new_WoW_loot_cards'; Upper Deck has sent news of the newest loot items in the WoW TCG, and yowza they're neat. These will all come in the new expansion, called The Hunt for Illidan and launching July 1st. The Path of Illidan, which is a super common loot card (like the Pet Biscuits), and will enable players to leave glowing green footprints around Azeroth and Outland as they walk around. D.I.S.C.O., which creates a disco party anywhere, along with a disco ball, lights, and music. And finally, most interesting, the Ethereal Soul-trader, who is a full-size Ethereal as a pet. Additionally, this card is actually a whole slew of items in one -- the Soul-trader will give you currency for creatures killed while summoned, which can then be traded off for other prizes, including special foodstuffs, a special alcoholic drink, a ball of energy (to throw in people's bags and play catch with), and even the Ethereal's outfits as wearable items. Pretty incredible. Upper Deck is hosting a preview of the next expansion on Saturday at various locations around the country, and the cards will be out, as we said, on July 1st. The Spectral Tiger Mount was great, but I think we have a new loot card winner with the Soul-trader. A mobile NPC with their own currency gained from killing mobs? Yes please.%Gallery-25476%
25 Easter eggs of the Burning Crusade
We at WoW Insider felt that, in honor of Easter/Noblegarden, we'd go looking for some of the best Easter eggs in Burning Crusade. This is by no means an exhaustive gallery of all the little nods you can find in BC; it's really almost impossible to go anywhere without running into a programmer's sly joke. I had to limit my gallery to things that could be seen by toons who'd outleveled some of the really good quest-related ones ("How To Serve Goblins" was great) or who had ready access to the Blood Elf/Draenei starter areas. Enjoy your trawl through a feast of cleverly-placed pop-culture references, and you can visit BlizzPlanet for an exhaustive list of Burning Crusade Easter eggs if these whet your appetite for more! Don't forget that with our new gallery functions, you can hit the "Hi Res" button at the top right of the page if you want to see a photo in more detail.%Gallery-18980%
Ethereal's HDMI/COAX extends 1440p up to 300-feet
HDMI has taken over in the living room, but custom installers still keep component video in their bag of tricks, especially for long runs (HDMI repeaters notwithstanding). There's plenty of bandwidth in coaxial, and longer runs are possible -- witness the Ethereal HDMI/COAX box that converts your HDMI input to signal on 4-conductor coax, and then carries the signal up to 300-feet downstream to an identical box that stuff all the bits back into HDMI. These HDMI-over-coax solutions are just the thing if you've already got coax running through your walls, you don't want to introduce any unnecessary digital-to-analog conversions into your data chain, and you've put your source components far away from their destination. No word on pricing, but you should be able to get your mitts on these in about 4 months.
Your Consortium bribe, uh payment is ready
Just a friendly reminder for those of you who have Friendly or better reputation with the Consortium that it's that time of the month again to collect your gems. I just got back from my run to Nagrand to hit up Mr. Swirlybandages for my bag. I was particularly excited because I had just hit Honored with that faction. And you know what I got? An Azure Moonstone and a Shadow Draenite. Uh...okay. I guess I'll try not to spend the 40s I'm gonna get for these on the AH all in one place. Hope you all get luckier this month.
